The author is a Forbes contributor. The opinions expressed are those of the writer.

Loading ...

Loading ...

This story appears in the {{article.article.magazine.pretty_date}} issue of {{article.article.magazine.pubName}}. Subscribe

Continued from page 4

There are simply times in cooking—whether northern or southern—when the perfect crispness of ingredients fried in pork fat and butter, or the creaminess and sharpness of cheddar cheese, or tang of sugar, lemon, and ice are precisely right, delectable. There are others where spears of cucumbers sitting in cold vinegar, or sour pickles, or lima beans, or corn on the cob, or hard-boiled eggs with toast are more comforting, better down-home eating than anything on god’s green earth.

We would not need to vilify our ingredients if we allowed that a cold piece of rich cheese, coated in bread crumbs and lightly fried in butter tastes best, and is most authentic just drizzled with the spicy vinegar you find on every southern table south, instead of hidden under other fried ingredients; that a donut isn’t bad or wrong, but probably most enjoyable with a cup of strong, black coffee, and most likely to linger enticingly if the meal it follows doesn’t obliterate all its sticky excitement.

That is what we’d learn, anyway, if we turned, as we try to improve our diets, to some of the best food our country has ever produced, and the joyous, skilled Southern cooks that created it.